


Something Just Like This

by enigma731



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Depression, Developing Relationship, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-16
Updated: 2019-04-16
Packaged: 2020-01-14 19:53:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,602
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18483235
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/enigma731/pseuds/enigma731
Summary: “Why didn’t you just tell me what was going on?” Natasha asks as the jet lifts out of the hangar.“Nothing’s going on,” Clint says flatly.“You’re depressed,” she tells him. “You’re taking medication for depression.”“We’re not going to have this conversation,” he insists. “That’s not the kind of thing you justasksomeone.”Natasha frowns. “Why? If you had a broken arm, you’d tell me immediately.”





	Something Just Like This

**Author's Note:**

> I started this fic in 2017 so like...better late than never, or something.

It isn’t exactly a routine. Or at least, not the way Natasha’s grown up thinking of that word -- It isn’t consistent, isn’t deliberate, exactly, though even she has to admit that she’s been looking for opportunities lately, or perhaps even going out of her way to create them. It isn’t a commitment, or any kind of explicit arrangement. It’s nothing they’ve talked about in words.

It _definitely_ isn’t a relationship, because that would be a liability, and liabilities are not a thing that she has. She’s been trained too well for that, even after eight months of S.H.I.E.L.D.’s bizarre rhetoric on teamwork and trust. 

Still, she has expectations when the day’s sparring session finishes with Clint pinned beneath her, breathing hard. He says nothing when she rolls off of him and pulls her hair out of its bun, shaking the damp curls loose down her back. He gets to his feet quickly, though, heads toward the locker room instead of going straight home to shower, though they’re both at the end of their day. 

It’s late -- was already past five when they arrived at the gym -- and the locker room is empty, as she’s hoped. That fact alone has become all the signal that’s necessary lately, and she follows close behind him as he selects one of the shower stalls, strips off his shirt. He looks good, she thinks, anticipation bubbling in the pit of her stomach as she turns to latch the stall door behind herself.

“Wait,” says Clint, raising a hand as though he’s only just noticed her proximity.

Natasha pauses, hand still on the latch, and raises an eyebrow, uncertain of where he’s going with this.

He pauses, looks like he’s searching for words. “I’m just going to shower today.”

“As opposed to…?” she prompts, still uncertain what game he’s trying to play. He usually isn’t one for teasing, at least not _here_ , but they are still getting to know one another. 

He blinks at her, looking like something isn’t connecting. “I’m _just_ going to shower.”

“Yeah,” says Natasha, wondering whether there’s some sort of joke she’s missing here, though it’s not like she isn’t well-trained in American humor. “And I’m _just_ going to shower with you.” She arches an eyebrow, pulls her shirt over her head.

“Stop,” Clint says sharply, his hands coming to rest on her shoulders with surprising firmness. 

She tenses, suddenly on edge, realizing that she’s miscalculated. “What?”

“I’m just going to shower,” he says again, his jaw tight. “Alone.”

The icy sense of disappointment that washes over her is a surprise. It isn’t because she’s been looking forward to this, she tells herself, though she is learning that he has very talented fingers. It isn’t because she’s worried about his emotional attachment to her--That would just be silly. And yet, she can’t deny the flush she feels rising in her cheeks, the way her throat’s gotten tight at his sudden rejection. 

Feeling suddenly cold, she pulls her shirt back on and sets her teeth. “Fine.”

She turns and leaves without giving him the opportunity to say anything else.

* * *

She’d been planning to head home after the presumed shower rendezvous, heat up something frozen for dinner and spend the night with a book. It’s been her routine practically every night since she was allowed to move out of immediate S.H.I.E.L.D. custody, a strange sort of comfort in being a creature of habit, though there’s nobody around to enforce it anymore. 

Suddenly that doesn’t appeal, though. She finds herself far too restless as she makes her way out of the building, still in her gym clothes. The sky is dark overhead when she steps out onto the street--dusk is coming, and there’s a heavy cloud cover besides, a cold wind catching her hair and making her shiver. The street outside HQ is still busy, the rush hour crowd still on its way home for the evening, and she lets herself blend into it, wandering without direction.

Clint’s rejection bothers her more than she’d like to admit, but if she’s being honest with herself, she’s more disturbed by _being bothered_ than anything else. It’s a vulnerable position, says the voice of some long-dead instructor at the back of her mind; but it’s not just that, not just the fact that this is evidence of her caring about another person. It’s the fact that she still doesn’t understand what’s just happened, has the distinct sense that she’s done something wrong.

It’s not the first time Clint’s rejected her sexual advances--he did plenty of that early on, when he’d thought she was acting out of some misguided sense of obligation. When he was _right_ about that. But that hasn’t been the case for months now, not since he’d realized how good they are together, that this doesn’t have to come with anything more complicated than raw chemistry. 

Even before sex had become a thing, Clint was irritatingly affectionate--finding her in the mess hall, bringing her coffee (and, later, tea), going out of his way to introduce her to the minutiae he considers quintessentially American. Now, wrapping her arms around herself against the wind, she searches her memory of the past few days, can’t come up with any instances of these behaviors. He’s been uncharacteristically quiet, which was easy to mistake for the kind of silent focus he turns on in the field. Only they haven’t been on an assignment recently, and he ought to be practically insufferable, going stir-crazy from the lack of action. She’s missed it because it was a relief--until today.

* * *

Clint is already in the mess hall when Natasha arrives, which is evidence enough that something’s changed between them. He’s usually the one interrupting her work day, pulling her away from trainings and mission reports to come get food with him. He’s also staunchly against eating at his desk, or even dining without company, when it can be avoided. Today, though, he’s seated at a table in the corner, mostly ignoring the sandwich on his plate. 

He’s hunched over a tablet, she sees as she gets closer, and at first she thinks he’s reading a briefing of some sort. But then she notices the way he’s moving one index finger over the screen, back and forth in irregular patterns. 

She furrows her brow as she sets her own food down across from him, peering at the upside-down display as she pulls out her chair. “What is that?”

He jumps, glances up, and the display flashes red, the words _GAME OVER_ visible even though she can’t quite discern the rest.

Clint throws up his hands. “Great. So much for that high score.”

Natasha studies him, surprised by his tone. He ought to be glad to see her, she thinks, judging by the lengths he usually goes to in terms of frivolous socialization. “Sorry. But what is it?”

He sighs. “Tetris. Just--Nevermind. What did you want?”

She blinks, glances down at her tray, then up at him again. “Lunch. Isn’t that what _you_ usually want with _me_?”

“Right.” For a moment he seems every bit as lost in this interaction as she feels. Then he shakes himself. “Actually, I was just about to head back.”

Natasha looks at his plate again. “Not hungry?”

He shrugs, slips the tablet under one arm and picks up his plate as he gets to his feet. “Food here sucks. What else is new.” 

“Are you avoiding me?” asks Natasha, but she’s already talking to his retreating back. If he hears the question, he doesn’t acknowledge it.

* * *

He’s bent over an expense report on his desk the next time she approaches. By all appearances, Clint has done more paperwork in the past two days than the entire rest of the time she’s been with S.H.I.E.L.D. combined. Normally he’s full of frenetic energy, practically incapable of sitting still--spinning in his chair, twirling pens, drinking cup after cup of coffee just for an excuse to take a walk to the canteen. Today he’s both quiet and still, doesn’t acknowledge her until she’s close enough for the sound of her voice to startle him.

“Clint.”

He jumps, glances up at her again. “What?”

“Coffee?” she offers, holding out the cup she’s brought. His usual caffeine supply’s been conspicuously absent from his cubicle today. In fact, she doesn’t think she’s seen him leave the office since arriving. 

He blinks at her in silence for a long moment, then reaches out and takes the cup from her. “What’s this for?”

Natasha frowns, studying him. “You like coffee. I brought you some.”

Clint takes a breath, seems as though he might be about to say something else, but then he just nods curtly. “Thanks.”

It seems like a clear indication that the conversation is over, that she’s expected to leave him alone now and get back to the report she’s been writing, but she lingers for a few beats longer, wanting to see what he’ll do. The form he’s been bent over, she notices, is blank. And it’s the same one that was on top of the stack yesterday morning as well. 

She watches him in her peripheral vision for the rest of the afternoon, sees the way the coffee sits untouched on the corner of his desk, the cream on top slowly congealing into a skin.

* * *

This situation, she decides, requires a definitive test.

It’s been nearly a week since the locker room incident, and there are no signs of her dynamic with Clint returning to normal. If anything, he’s become even quieter, even more withdrawn. She’s tried asking him straight out what’s wrong, tried to discern whether she’s done something to offend him, or whether he might be sick. Ordinarily, this is the sort of thing she’s good at--interrogation is her specialty, after all. And yet somehow she finds herself about as able to read him as a brick wall. It’s possible her judgment--at least when it comes to Clint--might be compromised after all.

When he avoids their usual joint training session altogether, she decides that it’s time to go back to basics. Foregoing the gym for the first time since she was given privileges to use the space, Natasha heads straight home and digs through her closet. She doesn’t own a lot, partly because going straight means limited finances, and partly because she’s never been allowed much in the way of material goods, has always been taught that’s another sort of vulnerability. 

She does have some pieces of wardrobe left over from her last deep cover job, though, and decides those will serve her purpose just fine. The lingerie is all black lace, and she slips it on quickly, opting for nothing else besides a long dark coat. 

She’s never been to Clint’s apartment, that particular boundary still a definite line in the sand of their relationship, but she knows where it is. Natasha doesn’t call ahead, doesn’t give him any chance to refuse, just weaves her way through the rush hour crowd until she reaches his building.

For a long moment after she knocks, she thinks that he might not be home. She has no proof of his presence, after all, has just assumed he’ll be here because he wasn’t in the office, or the gym, or the range where she can almost always count on finding him with his bow. But now there’s no response, and she’s starting to second guess herself when the door finally opens. 

“Hi,” she breathes, in the voice she normally reserves for marks. She’s playing a role right now, thoroughly committed.

Clint blinks at her, trying to get his bearings. “Nat, what the hell?”

“You missed our date,” says Natasha, undoing the belt on her coat, allowing him to see what she’s wearing under it, and also what she’s not. “In the gym. So I brought it to you.”

“What the _hell_?” he repeats, looking her up and down with an expression that’s a mix of disgust and alarm. “ _What the hell_. No.” 

He shuts the door in her face and doesn’t come back, his footfalls on the other side of it fading away with a finality she can’t deny. 

It isn’t until she’s made it most of the way back home, reeling, that she considers how utterly disheveled he’d looked, or the absolute filth she’d glimpsed in the apartment behind him.

* * *

The fact that she’s still earning S.H.I.E.L.D.’s trust means that Natasha doesn’t have much in the way of personal leave time yet, and she definitely can’t take off in the middle of the work day to chase a random hunch. Instead she waits for the weekend to head back toward Clint’s apartment, finds a table at the coffee shop across the street, and positions herself to watch the entrance. She spends most of the day observing futilely, has started to worry that he might simply remain inside all weekend when finally he emerges, in rumpled gym clothes, and heads down the block in the opposite direction.

Natasha waits five minutes after he disappears from view, then abandons her post and crosses the street. She makes her way back up the stairs to his apartment, picks the simple lock without effort. He has a security system, but it’s not activated, which in itself makes her frown.

The first thing she notices when she gets into the apartment is the kitchen. It actually smells slightly, which is what draws her attention initially, and when she gets closer, a cloud of tiny flies lifts into the air. She wrinkles her nose and bats them away, studying the scene in front of her. There are dirty dishes piled to the point of avalanche in the sink, some of them coated in what she’s pretty sure is mold. There’s also an impressive mountain of empty takeout containers, filling the trash can and then discarded beside it, several of these clearly weeks old and getting rank as well. 

Natasha turns away, unable to look anymore, something twisting painfully inside of her chest.

She moves from the kitchen into the living room, which is dusty and cluttered with half-empty pizza boxes, but overall less disgusting than the kitchen. The bedroom is predictably strewn with dirty laundry and coffee cups, the sheets on the bed rumpled and full of crumbs. 

In the bathroom she finds hair clippings and soap scum, dried globs of toothpaste in the sink. For a moment she pauses, for the first time feeling that perhaps it was a mistake to come here, to see any of this. She feels torn between disgust and pity, can’t square any of this with the Clint she’s come to know. He’s the guy who’s equal parts ridiculous and competent, the one who’s always telling her how she ought to be putting herself above the mission. The one who encouraged her to begin making her new living space into a home. Not the one she’s expected to find living in a dump.

She’s about to retreat, to declare this entire trip a miscalculation, when the bottle of pills sitting beside the sink catches her eye. She picks it up on impulse, scans the label.

 _Fluoxetine,_ it reads, and in smaller print, _Common brands: Prozac._ The instructions state _Take one pill daily for mood._

She loses track of how long she’s looked at the label, an odd sense of surreality washing over her. She knows what the pills are, knows they’re what the doctors here prescribe for depression. The suggestion was made to her, in fact, when she was going through the seemingly-endless process of untangling the traps the Red Room left in her mind. She also notices that the prescription’s been filled recently, less than a week ago. 

The sound of movement behind her brings Natasha back to the present, and she turns to find Clint standing behind her, a pizza box in one hand and a confused expression on his face.

“What the hell?” are the words that tumble out of her mouth instinctively, the shock of the meds, the filth, the way he’s been acting culminating in this moment.

He blinks, continuing to gape at her for a long moment before he manages to find his voice. “ _That’s_ what you’re going with in this situation? That’s rich, Nat.”

She can’t seem to find any words in response, feels utterly off-balance over the things she’s discovered today, somehow more oddly intimate than anything she’s ever extracted from a mark.

Clint puts the pizza box down, closes the distance between them and rips the bottle of pills roughly from her hand. “Get out. Now. Before I tell Fury he ought to take away all your shiny new privileges and throw you back in a cell.”

* * *

“You’re cleared for the field?” asks Natasha, as she slips into the jet, takes the copilot seat. He’s already strapped in, bent over the controls as he punches in their trajectory. 

It’s been two days since their run-in at his apartment, and he hasn’t spoken a word to her since then, nor met her eyes even once. She hasn’t lost her security clearance, though, or been dragged in for another round of psych evals, so it’s probably safe to assume he hasn’t followed through on his threat of reporting her to Fury. 

Now they’re headed off on assignment again--a scintillating security detail for a senior S.H.I.E.L.D. agent who’s out of commission for surgery--and she hopes he’ll be able to keep it together. 

“No,” Clint says stonily, not looking at her. “I stole this assignment from the other guy just so I could have the benefit of your company. Thought you might enjoy another opportunity to get your rocks off poking around in my business.”

She sighs. “I’m going to assume that’s sarcasm.”

“You strapped in?” he asks, engaging the jet’s thrusters before she’s had a chance to respond.

Natasha inhales as the jolt of ignition presses her back into her seat, tries to swallow her surprise. She’s seen him frustrated before, seen him ruthless in the field, but she’s never seen him angry like this, not toward her. 

“Why didn’t you just tell me what was going on?” she asks, leaning forward to double check their flight itinerary as the jet lifts out of the hangar. 

“Nothing’s going on,” Clint says flatly. “Except that _you_ broke into my apartment. Pretty sure you’re aware of that.”

“You’re depressed,” she says bluntly. “You’re taking medication for depression.”

“We’re not going to have this conversation,” he says firmly. “That’s not the kind of thing you just _ask_ someone.”

Natasha frowns. “Why? If you had a broken arm, you’d tell me immediately.”

“We’re _not_ going to have this conversation,” he repeats. “We’re going to focus on doing our damn jobs.” With that, he picks up a pair of headphones and slips them on, effectively shutting her out again.

* * *

She ought to be bothered by the idea of depression, she thinks. It’s a weakness, certainly, and she has always been taught to view those as...a liability, certainly, but also shameful. An ugly blemish on an otherwise formidable asset. Emotional weakness ought to be worse still, ought to flat-out disgust her. It has in the past, in marks she’s manipulated to the point of total psychological breakdown. And in training, in other girls less able to cope with the demands of the program. She has lived most of her life with the conviction that she would sooner die than break in this particular way. 

And yet, toward Clint, she feels none of those things. Not that she’s exactly _pleased_ with him right now. If she forces herself to put words to her -- yes, emotions, much as she’d still like to have none of those -- then she can come up with frustration, for one. Hurt at the fact that he’s kept this from her, purported to trust her as a partner, only not with this. A reminder that she does not deserve all of him, nor all of the faith that he might put in another agent. And there’s concern too, if she allows herself to dig down far enough. Clint is one of the only people she knows who might fit into a category approaching _friend._

She does not want to lose him, particularly to something so foolish.

“Did something happen that you didn’t tell me about?” asks Natasha, not really expecting a response. 

Clint is slouched down in his chair, looking uncharacteristically pale in the requisite hospital security uniform. He’s supposed to be watching half of the monitor screens in front of them and probably he is, but to all outward appearances, he’s entirely zoned out. 

“I mean, I don’t see any _reason_ for you to be depressed unless you’re hiding something,” she continues, having the conversation more with herself than with him. 

She’s studying him in her peripheral vision, watching for any miniscule sign of a response. The fact that he’s unable to get up and walk away without jeopardizing his career with S.H.I.E.L.D. is definitely an added bonus in this setting. 

“You’ve got a place to live,” she muses, “that would even be half nice if you’d taken out the trash in the past month. You’ve got a job. Pay sucks, but that never seemed to bother you before. I’m pretty sure you haven’t been on any assignments without me so...Oh! Break up with a secret girlfriend you never told me about?”

A muscle in his jaw jumps ever so slightly but otherwise he’s studiously ignoring her, which at the moment is reason enough to continue goading.

“Did the medication give you erectile dysfunction?” she asks bluntly.

“Jesus Christ!” he blurts, spinning around so fast the ancient chair he’s occupying squeals.

Natasha shrugs one shoulder, grateful that it’s the middle of the night and the hospital is currently quieter than the beginning of a horror movie. No actual threat to their mission. “I read that it’s a side effect, and you stopped wanting sex, so…”

He opens his mouth, closes it again, then gets to his feet.

“Wait!” she hisses, suddenly alarmed. She’s been goading him, she _knows_ that, but hurting him in a real way is the opposite of her goal. Clearly she’s miscalculated. “Wait, you can’t just--”

“If it gets me away from you, S.H.I.E.L.D. can fire both our asses.” Then he turns and walks away with more conviction than she’s seen from him in weeks.

* * *

Natasha doesn’t see him for the rest of the mission, which fortunately is only a couple of days before the asset is stable enough to be moved directly into a S.H.I.E.L.D. rehabilitation facility. 

It isn’t the type of job where she really requires a partner. 

To be fair, before coming to S.H.I.E.L.D., she has rarely done anything other than solo missions, yet it feels odd being entirely on her own now, especially when she knows that isn’t how this was intended to be. Nothing happens to warrant backup, though, and nobody mentions Clint’s absence. Not even during her debrief with Coulson, which is more disconcerting than comforting. 

When she still doesn’t see him upon her return to the office, she wonders whether he’s been suspended or perhaps actually fired. She wonders whether she is next, although it seems a waste not to have mentioned it in the debrief if so. Then she wonders whether he’s reported back at all or somehow simply vanished, decided to fall off the grid. Whether, perhaps, he’s fully succumbed to the influence of depression.

She spends the day in a haze of guilt and panic that she’ll never admit to anyone, utterly fails despite many tries to convince herself that it’s better this way, if there is no potential for any sort of emotional attachment between them. Too late for that, clearly. That’s the entire problem here.

She leaves as soon as her reports are finished, skips the gym and her usual training. She goes to Clint’s apartment first, heart sinking when she finds no signs of life. He isn’t here, and she’s certain she won’t find him anywhere at S.H.I.E.L.D.. Beyond that, she doesn’t even know where to begin looking for him, which is alarming in and of itself.

Defeated, she heads home to her own apartment...only to find the door conspicuously open. Natasha pauses for a moment in the hallway, listening, then steps through, ready to fight if necessary. 

She’s equal parts relieved and irritated to find Clint in her living room, making a rather obvious show of going through the bookshelf. 

She crosses to the middle of the room before speaking, not bothering to make her stride silent. He clearly wants to be seen, is doing this to make a statement. “If you’d like to go through my underwear, it’s in the top left drawer of the dresser.”

“Nah,” says Clint, “this is way more interesting.” He pulls a book from the shelf, then turns to face her. “Harry Potter? Really?”

She shrugs. “I am acquainting myself with American popular culture.”

He snorts, not nicely. “You seem to be researching lots of things lately. Pop culture, medications, how to lose all your friends…”

“You’re here in retaliation for my searching your apartment,” says Natasha, crossing her arms. “You think it’ll upset me the same way it upset you. I have some sad news, though.”

“Can’t wait to hear this,” says Clint.

“You already know secrets of mine that are far worse than anything you’ll find here.”

“Oh, I know,” says Clint. “I know your past, your kill record. But now I also know that you can’t cook to save your life and that most of your socks have holes in them. Somehow that seems _way_ more embarrassing, doesn’t it?”

She arches an eyebrow. “To me? Not particularly. But if it will make you less angry with me then I’ll be happy to pretend.”

For a moment he just stares at her, clearly at a loss for words. Then he throws the book down and his hands up. “Fine. Fine, you win. Is that your goal here, Nat? To prove your superiority? Kick me when I’m down? Fine, go ahead. I know you like torturing your marks.”

Natasha recoils at that, her rejection of that idea so deep and instinctive that she doesn’t even have a moment to consider self-discipline or control. Instead she takes a step backward in a full-body flinch, the air going out of her lungs as though he’s actually hit her. “That’s not--”

“Save it,” says Clint, abandoning his search through her apartment with the clear intent of leaving again, of walking out of this fight and possibly out of her life entirely. “We both know you’re a great actress.”

She moves faster than he does, gets to the doorway in time to block it despite his longer stride. Natasha puts her arms out to occupy the full space, tilts her chin up defiantly. “It is _not_ an act.”

For a moment she thinks he might actually push her out of the way, has half an instant to consider whether or not she’ll put up a fight if he does, whether that would be even more of a mistake. Those seem to be all she’s able to make with him lately.

But then Clint blows out a breath, uncrosses his arms and shoves his hands into his pockets. “Fine. Enlighten me then. What _do_ you want from me?”

She takes a breath, is surprised to find her voice caught in her throat, mired in a dam of emotion: fear, regret, above all loneliness. “I just--want my friend back.”

He makes a soft, utterly wounded sound at that, his turn to flinch as though he’s been struck. But then he sets his jaw again, eyes cold. “If you’re my friend, then leave me the hell alone.”

She moves because she has to, because she knows on some level deeper than instinct that she will lose him forever if she doesn’t. Still, listening to his footsteps fade down the hall is the most helpless feeling she can ever recall.

* * *

Natasha doesn’t sleep. 

She doesn’t read, either, or train, or any of the half-dozen actually productive things she could do with the time. She is well-versed in how to handle sleepless nights, after all. But this one feels different, the sense of helplessness refusing to dissipate as though she can almost hear Clint’s footfalls still echoing their way out of her life.

She is losing him, she knows. He’s taking medication, ostensibly, but it doesn’t seem to be helping. There’s no sign of his usual humor, or the infectious warmth he’s used to break down all of the walls she’s tried to put between them. There’s no sign of his usual passion for his job, either -- It’s been more than a week since he’s been to the range or done any kind of work on new tech for his arrows. 

It’s clear that she isn’t going to fix this by providing things that he ordinarily enjoys. She’s seen his lukewarm reactions to food and coffee, let alone sex. Logic doesn’t seem to apply either. She has the feeling that talking might help him, if she knew how to do the right kind of talking. She clearly doesn’t, though, has only managed to make things worse. She _has_ been treating him like a mark, she realizes, because it’s all she knows. She has been learning to be his friend, but she’s been utterly lost since that all shifted. 

It’s only about an hour to sunrise when she decides to give up on the idea of rest, or of figuring out an answer that will bring back the Clint she’s been missing. Instead she showers and dresses, arranges her face into a careful mask of professionalism before walking into HQ.

There are a few leads she’s supposed to be working on, but nothing pressing. Instead she finds herself drawn to Clint’s cubicle and the stack of paperwork that’s been sitting and growing for weeks. He’s done nothing more than play with pens and stare at it, as though that might somehow cause it to complete itself.

Sliding into his chair, Natasha picks up the pen she’s seen him twirl between his fingers so many times and starts by writing the date into the form on top. She gets into a rhythm with it, finding and organizing the mundane details of their past few missions. She’s nearly to the bottom of the pile by the time she becomes aware that the rest of the office has come to life around her and of Clint’s presence behind the chair.

She spins slowly, still holding the pen as she arches an eyebrow at him, not quite a challenge.

“I think I told you to leave me alone,” says Clint. There’s no conviction behind the words now, though. None of the vitriol from twelve hours earlier. Instead he just looks exhausted, the shadows under his eyes deeper than ever, and sad too.

“You weren’t here when I arrived,” Natasha points out, her tone carefully neutral. 

Clint sighs, apparently not even bothering to follow that line of arguing any further. “What are you doing?”

“Your paperwork,” says Natasha, suddenly feeling oddly self-conscious about that.

He stares at her in silence for a moment, then swallows visibly, his throat working in a way that she can’t quantify. “Why?”

“I…” She trails off, searching for a way to articulate the instinct she’s been acting on. “If I wasn’t feeling well, I’d want somebody to do mine.”

He takes another breath, this one with an audible hitch in it, then abruptly turns away. For a moment she’s certain that she’s said the wrong thing, that he’s leaving to actively avoid her again. But then he reappears, pushing the chair from her cubicle next door, and she remembers that she’s currently occupying his.

Clint sits down on his backward, heavily enough that the springs make a little noise of protest. He rests his chin on the back of his, unperturbed. “You really suck at this, Nat. But I guess that’s fair.”

She bristles instinctively, forces herself to swallow it down because at least he’s here and he’s looking at her for the first time in days. “I didn’t mean to hurt you. Though clearly that’s what happened.”

He raises both eyebrows, the expression a mix of cynicism and incredulity. “That your version of an apology?”

“No,” says Natasha, a bit defiantly. “This is: I’m sorry that I don’t know how to help you. But I’d like someone to, so that this can go away.”

Clint tenses again, clearly displeased by some part of that. “Look, it’s not--I’ve never told anyone about this before, okay? Nobody besides Fury, because he had to know, and the S.H.I.E.L.D. doc who prescribes the meds.”

“I can keep secrets,” says Natasha, then thinks better of it in light of the things she’s done in the past couple weeks. “I _will_ protect this one for you.”

He nods, clearly understanding the meaning behind those words, accepting it as he has so many things from and about her. “I told you I got kicked out of the Army, right? Except it wasn’t for insubordination, it was for this. Failed the damn routine psych eval. Gotta be perfectly stable to put your life on the line, right?”

“I understand programs that eliminate assets for having flaws,” says Natasha, meeting his gaze and holding it for a long moment until she feels something shift.

“Good thing S.H.I.E.L.D. doesn’t care if you need to pop pills, or if you used to be brainwashed,” says Clint. “Long as you’ve got skills they want and your crazy doesn’t get in the way too much, you’re good.”

“It’s been that long?” asks Natasha, doing mental math as she thinks about what he’s said of his Army days. That seems almost impossible to believe, given both how much he seems to be suffering and the distinct change that’s come over him in the past few weeks. Then again, it’s hardly like she understands the condition in detail.

He shrugs. “Well, that was the first time. It’s been on and off since then. Some times are great, others are...not.”

“And the past few weeks are _not_ ,” she supplies. She lets the reality of that sink in for a moment before she speaks again. “So--okay. How do we fix it?”

Clint laughs mirthlessly, the sound surprising her. “We don’t. I usually just….wait it out. Take the meds. Eventually it goes away, until it comes back again. Rinse, repeat. Sure you still wanna be here? ‘Cause I wouldn’t want to be around me if I had a choice.” He looks hopeless as he says it, as defeated as any of her marks who’s just realized the inescapable trap they’re caught in.

Natasha purses her lips, then says the first thing that comes to mind. “Do you want coffee? I’ll buy.”

* * *

Clint really ought to just give her a key.

She isn’t surprised when he doesn’t respond to her knock. It’s Sunday, after all, and although he’s at least stopped actively avoiding her for the past few days, it’s clear that things aren’t really getting better for him yet. It’s painful to watch, even knowing what’s going on, knowing that it isn’t personal. And as far as his conviction that nothing can be done to improve the situation, that the only thing for it is to suffer and wait...well, she’s had plenty of other ostensibly impossible missions, has yet to truly fail.

So she doesn’t let his lack of response deter her, instead picks the lock the same way she has the last few times, then re-secures it behind herself.

“Clint?” she calls, only half-expecting a response. She knows what she’s going to do whether he’s here or not.

The inside of the apartment is no better than the last time she saw it. She’s hoped for but not really expected improvement. Instead the smell is more noticeable, the pile of dishes more precarious, the cloud of flies thicker.

“Clint!” she calls again, a bit louder, and sets the rather large bag of supplies she’s brought on the floor.

She gets something approximating a grunt from the bedroom in response and follows it. Clint is buried in what appears to be a nest of pillows and twisted blankets, the lights off and the blinds closed though it’s well after noon. Still, there’s enough light slipping through that she can make out his face. If she didn’t already know the truth, she’d think he had the flu.

“Hi,” she breathes, uncertain for the first time about this particular choice. The last thing she wants to do is hurt him again, and the vulnerability she’s seeing now is palpable, far more intense than anything else she’s experienced with him. 

Clint sits up, scrubs a hand over his face and then back through his hair, which looks decidedly greasy. “What’re you doing, Nat?”

“I’m--I was--” She trails off, worry for him superseding any apprehension over how he’s going to react to her presence here. “Have you gotten out of bed at all today?”

He snorts, all bitterness and no humor. “What does it look like?”

“It looks like you feel like shit,” she says honestly.

This time he actually laughs, though it’s still completely devoid of mirth. “Seriously, what are you doing here? I told you that you can’t fix this.”

“I know,” says Natasha, the feeling of helplessness welling in the back of her throat again. “I was--going to do your dishes. Maybe take out the trash.” She feels heat rise in her cheeks at saying those words aloud, at how completely futile they seem now, like any of those things would matter at all. “I just--wanted to do something.”

She expects Clint to scoff at that, or maybe to be angry, to feel belittled by the thought that any of those things could be meaningful at all. Instead he seems to collapse into himself, the tension going out of his shoulders, his face crumpling in a way that makes her think he’s going to cry. He doesn’t quite get that far, though.

“Natasha,” he whispers, the syllables of her name catching against the dam of emotion in his throat. He doesn’t seem to be able to get any other words out after that, but the surprise and gratitude are evident anyway.  
Over the past few months she has considered what would happen if he were to be injured in the field. She’s pictured sitting by his bedside, keeping vigil. She’s just never imagined the hostiles would be inside of his own head. 

“What if I just--stay with you for a while?” she offers, crossing to the edge of the bed but not moving any further without his permission.

He considers for a moment, then nods. “Yes. Please.”

She nods, hesitates only for the span of another breath, then steps out of her shoes and slips in beside him. Clint finds her hand under the covers, lacing their fingers and squeezing gently. Natasha offers him the barest hint of a smile, content for the moment to wait in the darkness with him.


End file.
